


summer fading

by meridies



Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Angst with a Happy Ending, Breaking Up & Making Up, M/M, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-30
Updated: 2020-10-30
Packaged: 2021-03-08 21:47:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,426
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27273676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meridies/pseuds/meridies
Summary: At the end of high school, Dream left George behind without a word of goodbye. Now, four years later, he's returned.
Relationships: Clay | Dream/GeorgeNotFound (Video Blogging RPF)
Comments: 69
Kudos: 1141





	summer fading

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Qekyo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Qekyo/gifts).
  * Translation into Русский available: [Restricted Work] by [Oceanya](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Oceanya/pseuds/Oceanya). Log in to view. 



> for ness qekyo, i hope you enjoy this halloween treat <3

Dream is back.

He’s back where he usually sits, chewing at the sliver of nail on his thumb, notepad out and back up against the old oak tree beside the elementary school. If George looks hard enough he can still see where they carved their initials in the soft bark, right below the first bough. Thankfully, it’s mostly smoothed over by now.

George wonders if Dream still looks at their names together.

The first time he sees him, George nearly walks right past him before doing a practically comedic spit take. Because he’s _back—_ back after four years, back after _four_ _years_ of near radio silence.

He told everyone else that he was leaving. Why didn’t he tell George? 

George does his best to ignore him, and prays that Dream doesn't notice him, but George has always been unlucky. He’s always been so, so unlucky. 

“George,” Dream calls, and George ducks his head and keeps walking. His shoes are threadbare, and the sole on his right shoe is practically falling off. He’ll need to be saving up if he wants to replace them.

The thing is, rent is due in a few days’ time, and he also needs to go grocery shopping, and the job at the burger place only pays fifteen dollars an hour and he’s got so much to do and so little time to accomplish it all. At home, his fridge is practically empty, and he already lives in the most run-down place possible. He doesn’t really have time to spare. He doesn’t have money to spend. And he certainly doesn’t have enough damn energy to spend on Dream, who is standing up, journal tucked in the pocket of his brown leather bag, worn-through and patched up a million different ways, and walking after George.

“George!” Dream calls again, and this time George can’t pretend that he hasn’t heard him. 

He turns around and allows himself a few precious seconds to take in the sight of his first and only ex-boyfriend.

He looks so—

He looks—

“Hi,” George says stiffly. He crosses his arms over his chest and raises his chin in the barest show of indifference. It’s really the most he can manage, at this point.

“Hi,” Dream says, and he slows. For a moment, they stand there, neatly divided by the cracks in the sidewalk that radiate in spiderwebs underneath their feet. George wonders if he’s going to fall or if he’s going to keep standing. Now that they’re both standing in front of each other, Dream looks a lot less arrogant than he did four years ago.

Good, George thinks, fighting to keep his cool. He should have shed some of his ego a long time ago. 

“Hi,” Dream repeats, and he looks a little unsure. “It’s been a while.”

“Yeah,” George says. “It has.”

Four years. Four damn years. Four years of George stuck in this small town, in the middle of nowhere, wondering if he had lost his inspiration to keep going. Four years of Dream, up in the north, among the snow and ice and blustery winds. He stayed there, at college, over all the last few summers. He didn’t bother returning. 

“Well,” Dream says, “How are you?”

What kind of question is that? How the hell is George supposed to answer? 

“Decent,” George says. “You.”

“Fine,” Dream responds. He looks even more hesitant now. Hands tucked into his pockets and everything, bag slung over his shoulder. “I wasn’t sure whether you were still here or not.” 

George manages the tightest smile he can bear. “Still here.” 

“Yeah,” Dream echoes. “I can see that.” 

“I thought you were going to stay away,” George says, before he can clamp his mouth shut.

Dream laughs uneasily. “It’s been a long time.” 

Everything about the conversation burns. He wishes Dream had just let him continue walking. 

“I have to go,” George lies, even though today is his one free day of the week, and he really has nowhere to go. 

“Oh,” Dream says. “Are you sure?”

When George nods, Dream asks, “I’ll see you around, right?”

He’s asking a lot of questions for someone who will likely refuse to answer any of George’s. George, pointedly, doesn’t say that. 

He shrugs and says, “Maybe.”

“It would be nice,” Dream says.

He opens his mouth like he wants to say something else, but then closes it again, looking for the whole world like he’s speechless. 

George almost says  _ see you,  _ or  _ are you staying longer?  _ or  _ will you be here the entire summer, too?  _ but all he does is forcibly turn on his heel and walk away. He doesn’t dare glance back to see if Dream is retreating as well. 

His feet step over the sidewalk lines, one over the other, and he counts them in patterns of four. He’s hoping for something, but he doesn't even know what that something is. 

He isn’t sure whether he wants Dream to stay or go or leave or return. He isn’t sure whether he wants to see every inch of him again or whether he wants Dream to vanish from his life forever.

He wants, he wants, he wants—

George tries to keep his hands from shaking. 

* * *

Senior year of high school had arrived, and college suddenly became a force to be reckoned with.

Dream, who came from a wealthy Ivy League legacy family, had no issues about where to apply. The entire world was in front of him, ready to be peeled and devoured like an orange. George scrambled to finish his homework, ducked in the back room of a Starbucks in the middle of his shifts. Why did it cost so much money simply to send your test scores to a college? It already cost enough damn money to take the standardized tests in the first place. What the hell was the school system on about? 

“If you wanted—” Dream began, one sunny afternoon, and George shook his head. 

“I’m good,” he said.  _ I don’t want your charity.  _

“Are you sure?”

“I’m sure,” George confirmed. Everything about the situation, abruptly, felt unbearably intimate. Even sitting there, at a picnic table, across from each other, in broad daylight. 

Dream seemed to sense the sudden tension too. His foot nudged at George’s ankle under the table, and George did his best to let the awkwardness of the situation slip from his shoulders. He kicked Dream back, and engrained the memory of Dream’s dimples into his memory. 

The tension, thankfully, bleeds away.

* * *

He remembers saying  _ goodbye,  _ but for him it was more of a  _ see you later. _

Apparently, Dream did not take it as such. 

* * *

Now, July is hot and heavy, breathing down the backs of everyone’s necks. Florida is humid during the summer, enough that there are days where George feels like he’s breathing in thick soup rather than air. His black jeans stick to him like a second skin, glued there with sweat, and he takes a break to simply stand in front of the rusty fan in the back room to try and get his heaving chest under control. It’s tiring itself out trying to spread a chill, but it’s better than nothing. 

“Move over,” Sylvee says imperiously, the doors swinging open behind her, and George can see sweat glistening at her temple as well. She unties her bright red apron with a dramatic flourish, tosses it over the bench, and obligingly George takes a step to the side. 

“It’s so fucking hot,” she sighs. 

“I know,” George mutters. He glances up at the clock. He has five more minutes until his break ends— either that, or until he’s dragged out by some customer needing something. He intends to savor every second until then. 

Absentmindedly, Sylvee says, “You think they’ll ever fix the air conditioning?”

George sends a skeptical glance towards the air conditioning unit in the corner, rusty and rattling. It’s been broken for the last few months. George can’t count the number of times he’s sent an email to their manager about it, and yet every day he comes into the back room to see that it’s not getting any better.

“Doubt it,” George says, and prods Sylvee lightly. “Move over. My turn.”

“Fuck off,” she says, but moves over so that the blowing air rushes over George instead. This entire day feels awful, pounding through his skull. It’s one of those days where the only good thing about it is that it’s going to end. 

“By the way,” Sylvee says, “You’ll never guess who just walked in out there.” 

George’s heart falls. “Are you kidding me?” 

Sylvee flashes him a wry grin. “Shocking, I know.”

George resists the urge to peer around the corner and look out between the swinging double doors to catch the barest glimpse. “Is he here by himself?”

“What?” Sylvee wrinkles her nose. “No, he’s not a creep. He’s here with the rest of your friends. Sapnap and Karl.” 

George scowls. “Of course.” 

Of course Dream is out there with his two best friends, because of course they don’t understand the impact that Dream had left on him. After all, why would they? Both Sapnap and Karl have had their fair share of significant others, in and out of love. It never bothered them to the extent that it bothered George. 

It’s not the same for them. They would never understand.

“Go on and get ‘em,” Sylvee says, and smacks George's arm. “I’m officially going on break for the next fifteen minutes. You can deal with them all you want.”

“Fuck you,” George says, and ignores the painful throbbing of his heart. 

He has a job to do, and it doesn’t matter if the three of them used to come here all the time back when they were teenagers, back when they were young and unaware. George wonders if the three of them are still sitting in the booth in the back, the curved one, with the ripped red leather seats and the scuffed linoleum tables. It’s the best place to sit in the house, right next to the twenty five cent jukebox that they would play the shittiest tunes on. 

George retires his apron around his waist, pockets a pen and a spiral notebook for orders, and braces himself to deal with the situation. 

And he’s right. They are sitting at that corner booth in the back. Karl is still picking at the red leather seats, even though there’s a sign that asks patrons to firmly  _ not  _ destroy the seating arrangements. George doesn’t have the heart to ask him to stop.

The worst part about the entire situation is that they barely notice him, right up and until he’s standing in front of the three of them ready to take their order. 

“Hi,” George says, a practiced smile on his face. “What can I get you guys to eat?” 

“Hey, George,” Sapnap greets, and he looks so at  _ ease—  _ legs kicked up underneath the table to prop on Karl’s lap, arm slung over Dream’s shoulders, smiling. “The usual, right?” 

He looks to Dream for confirmation, who nods and shrugs. “Chocolate milkshake—”

“With malt,” George finishes, the words spilling out before he can remind himself to be quiet. 

Dream opens his mouth, and closes it, and then says, “Yeah. With malt.”

George presses his lips together tightly and focuses on writing down the orders. He stubbornly ignores the gleeful look that Karl and Sapnap share, and when he looks back up, everyone has righted their gazes back into something normal.

“Anything else?” George prompts, and their words blur together in his mind, even though he’s sure he writes down what they want clearly. The words that he does hear are: 

“Come and sit with us,” Karl says. “It’s not that busy, you can spare a few minutes, right?”

George’s eyes flick between the clock on the wall to the half-scattered patrons, sitting throughout the restaurant, and he thinks of Sylvee in the back room, tired and exhausted, and he says, “It’s a little busy right now. I can’t.”

“It’s really not,” Dream says. “There’s only like fifteen people in here.”

George’s gaze turns steely, and he fights to keep his composure. Shouldn’t Dream know better? Shouldn’t he be more tactful, more kind? What happened to the Dream that George used to know?

A million responses surge through his mind, each more bitter than the last, but he eventually swallows his pride and says, “I’ll see if I can spare a few minutes.” 

He goes back to the back room, deposits the order, and braces his arms on the counter and tries to remind himself to breathe. Sylvee has around ten minutes left on her break. They’ll get through the last few hours of this together. 

George does not spare a few minutes for them. If he passes his tables off to Sylvee in the middle, neither Dream, Sapnap, nor Karl comment on it.

* * *

“He’s back,” Sapnap says to him, a few days later. 

“Huh,” George says blankly, and refuses to show the slightest sign of any emotion. “Who?”

“Really?” Sapnap says, smile edging at his mouth. “You’re going to play that card with me?”

“I don’t care,” George says, even though there are a million responses for things that he wants to say, bouncing around his mind. 

George is standing in front of the antique shop, right on the main street of the downtown area. It’s called  _ Trinkets and Traditions,  _ and it’s a small, windowless shop with the most cramped corridors that George has ever seen. He used to go inside a lot, back with his friends, and they would laugh at how Dream would always immediately head to the back portion of the store with its towering bookshelves. Said that he loved reading through the old poetry, even though it was some of the blandest shit George had ever read. 

_ Trinkets and Traditions  _ is known for being a place people can vanish into. George wishes he could do the same. 

“I think you care,” Sapnap says. “Scratch that, actually. I  _ know _ you care.” 

George crosses his arms and says nothing. 

“Come on,” Sapnap says. “I know he’s an asshole. Believe me.”

_ Asshole  _ is understating it. If Dream wanted to break up with him so much, why didn’t he just say it out loud?

“Give him a chance,” Sapnap says.

“He told you that he was leaving,” George says sharply. 

That’s the truth of it. Both Sapnap and Karl were practically shocked when the truth was revealed: that Dream had quietly confessed to the two of them that he was leaving for college a month early, and hadn’t told George a single word about it. 

_ Why,  _ George’s mind chants,  _ why, why, why?  _

He picks a direction and starts walking, and Sapnap follows him without giving him a chance to catch his breath. 

“He did,” Sapnap says. “It’s been years. He’s back now.” 

The thing with Dream is that he’s a terrible person. A terrible, terrible person. And George hates him. He hates him so much that he can’t even put it into words.

And yet he feels like he’s not himself without Dream. In the first week after Dream left for college (direct flight to Connecticut, where he was going to Yale, fucking Yale, of all places) George had been terribly heartbroken. He didn’t even know what to do. It had taken several long talks with Sapnap, of all people, in order to get him to function like a normal person again.

Now Dream is back. He’s back and he doesn’t even seem to give a shit. 

“Did he tell you to come and talk to me?” George demands.

Sapnap scowls. “No. I’m here of my own accord.” 

“Fuck off.”  _ Liar.  _

“I would tell you if he told me to come here. I’m not some stupid messenger.” 

George crosses his arms, looks at the cracks in the pavement beneath his feet, and finally reaches the end of the block. It’s a red light. 

“I think you should just talk to him,” Sapnap says. “Trust me, he wants to talk to you too. You’re both acting like children.”

Something inside of George frays a little further, one second closer to snapping. “How on earth am I acting like a child? Have you forgotten that he was the one who broke up with me?”

“It’s been four years!”

“Fuck off,” George says again, and the light turns green.

Sapnap doesn’t listen, and follows him across the street. A taxi making an illegal left turn honks sharply at the two of them, and irritated, George holds up his middle finger at the driver. 

“Jesus,” Sapnap huffs, “You’re in a mood.”

George tries to summon up the energy to glare at him, but it doesn’t quite work. All of his energy is focused on putting one foot in the front of the other. 

“You two should just talk,” Sapnap sighs. “Even Karl is tired of it.” 

“Karl can talk to me himself if he wants to.” 

“He’s  _ tried, _ ” Sapnap says. “He told me that the last time he showed up at your place you closed the door on him.” 

George winces. That much is true. To be fair, it was the second time he had run into Dream, and all of his nerve endings were too wired for him to listen to anyone, much less someone who was probably going to try and tell him to listen to Dream, to work things out. 

George doesn’t say anything until they reach the next crosswalk, and this time, when George steps out into the street, Sapnap leaves him behind. 

“He’s waiting,” Sapnap calls after him. “So whenever you want to talk, he’ll listen.” 

* * *

Senior year was a wonderful time for George.

George remembers prom, which makes him feel vaguely stupid to remember. He’s always heard that it’s ridiculous to act like you peaked in high school, and he thinks that valuing high school senior prom as one of the best nights in his life is just further proof that he’s never going to go anywhere or do anything with his life. He’s just going to stay George Davidson, stuck in their little small town forever, continually servicing people at the burger joint until the day his bones crumble and fade into dust.

He remembers prom because it was one of the last times that he had a truly fun time with his friends. He remembers the way the four of them escaped from the dance floor to the outside, suit jackets undone and flying out into the night. It was misty and cool, a welcome reprieve from the stuffy, sweaty interior. 

It was a few minutes later, after Sapnap and Karl had run off somewhere, leaving Dream and George alone.

George looked up at the sky and found it speckled with stars, each one brighter than the last. Music filtered through from the outside, barely audible, but George could clearly tell that it had changed to a slow moving song. 

“Dance with me,” Dream said suddenly. 

George turned to him, tilted his head curiously. “Really?”

Dream shrugged, but even George could tell how red his cheeks had gone. “If you wanted.” 

“Okay,” George said, sure his face was bright red as well. “Let’s dance.” 

Carefully, slowly, gently, George looped his arms around Dream’s neck, and Dream put his hands on George’s waist, and for a moment, neither of them moved before abruptly remembering that they were supposed to be dancing. Then, they merged into a slow half-step, one way, then the other, and eventually they hit a rhythm.

“This is nice,” George murmured. 

Dream nodded. “I like this.” 

“You look really pretty tonight,” George blurted. 

A small, loopy smile spread across Dream’s face, smoother than butter, and impulsively George leaned up on his tiptoes to kiss it off. 

“You look really pretty too,” Dream mumbled against George’s lips, and before George could even feel embarrassed about it, he was kissing Dream again. 

The music inside changed from a slow, gentle song to something that was much more upbeat, but neither Dream nor George moved from their position, arms around the other, so close that George could feel each beat of Dream’s heart. One after the other, slow and steady. 

_ I like this moment. I want to stay here forever.  _

* * *

He thought that he was finally over Dream. Apparently, he wasn’t.

Because now Dream is sitting there in front of him, yet again, lips wrapping around the paper milkshake straw, all striped red and white. He swipes a handful of fries off of Sapnap’s plate to eat, and he grins, face practically splitting in two. In the Floridian summer heat, he’s less tan than that George would usually remember him as, but he still has the same countless freckles, sprawled up and down his arms in smatterings of brown. 

He’s back at the burger place. He’s there with Sapnap and Karl  _ again _ , in the corner booth. 

George puts down a plate of whatever Karl ordered in front of him and prays that they don’t ask for him to sit and talk. This time, he really has no exception. The three of them are the only patrons in the restaurant, and George can’t claim that it’s busy just to get away from them. 

Thankfully, they don’t say anything. 

George remembers quiet mornings over the winter vacations. He remembers waking Dream up by kissing each freckle up and down his arms, slowly, gently. He remembers seeing Dream’s content smile, curled up between sheets and comforters like they were petals of a flower. He remembers the way Dream’s legs felt tangled in his, warm to the touch and hotter than fire. He remembers the way Dream pressed his fingers against George’s lips, held them there for a moment, before tugging down on George’s lower lip just to hear the way it made a small  _ fwpp  _ sound. He smiled. He laughed. George treasured that laugh more than he treasured anything in the entire world. 

Memories are strange in that they’re malleable and they change with the wind, with whatever emotion George is feeling at the time. He’s had plenty of time to look back on the times with Dream and think about them, but this time, instead of being tinged with bitterness, anger, envy, all he feels is quiet sorrow.

George looks at the three of his friends, sitting in the corner booth, and listens to the song that Karl puts on the jukebox with the last quarter in his pocket. It’s an upbeat, poppy song, with more synth-like instrumentals than decent lyrics. 

Dream takes another sip from the milkshake, licks salt off his finger. George tries very hard not to stare and most definitely fails. 

* * *

Dream is there when the restaurant closes up later that night. He’s standing there, clad in that black leather jacket that makes his shoulders look ridiculously broad. George wants to wrap his hands all over that stupid torso, press fingers into the dip between his neck and shoulder. 

“George,” Dream says, and his fingers twitch at his side slightly, “Can we talk?” 

He looks just like George remembers. That’s the worst part. He’s a little paler, perks of living up north in a snowy state rather than sunny Florida, and his hair is a little lighter because of it, but other than that, this Dream is nearly identical to the Dream George knew from four years ago. Same peachy color to his cheeks when he’s flushed. Same specks of hazel in his eyes. Same calluses to his hands, same open, honest look on his face. Same cowlick on the back of his head, that curls up no matter how much he tries to stop it. 

“I have nothing to say to you,” George says, and fights to keep his voice steady.

“Come on,” Dream says, “I know you do.”

“Well, you thought wrong.”

“But— George!” 

George turns away, after checking that the doors of the restaurant are firmly locked, and stuffs his hands in his pockets. The very sight of Dream is agonizing. Hearing his voice, saying George’s name again, feels like a splash of acid to the soul.

“George,” Dream says, and puts a hand on his shoulder. “Wait, please.”

“No,” George says harshly, “I’m done with waiting. I waited years.” 

“Then let me  _ talk!”  _ Dream says, and this time he grabs onto the loose fabric around George’s side, sending sparks ricocheting up and down the entirety of George’s body with how damn close he is to him. “Let me talk to you, please. Don’t you remember—” 

“No, I don’t remember,” George says coldly, and fights to keep his tone from being too harsh. “I feel like I would have remembered if you had even given me an ounce of knowledge as to where you went.”

Dream steps backward, uncurls his hand from George’s shirt, and he glances down and picks at his nails and George remembers wrapping band-aids around his fingertips when they bled, one after the other. He remembers how those hands feel in his. He wonders if Dream thinks the same. 

“I was going to tell you,” Dream says, voiceless, into the sunset.

“But you didn’t.”

“I know,” Dream says, and he looks frustrated. George’s stomach writhes. Dream doesn’t have the right to feel upset about this. 

Then he says, “I’m sorry.”

Something cold inside of George snaps, fraying to its breaking point. He scoffs. “Yeah. You’re sorry.”

“I am,” Dream insists. “I promise.”

“You promise?” George repeats. “You promised you were going to stay. Or did you forget that?” 

“I—” Dream looks down. “I remember.” 

“And remembering it sure made a difference, huh?” 

Dream’s face twists up and he blinks down at the ground. “I’m bad with goodbyes,” he says thickly. “I know I was in the wrong.” 

“That’s not good enough.”

“I know,” Dream repeats miserably. There’s a sinking feeling in George’s stomach, twisting and turning in knots, coiling until it’s nothing more than a pit of lead in his gut. 

The setting sun beats down on the backs of both their necks, even though it should be nighttime at this point. It’s stupidly hot. Sweat beads at George’s temple. He hates July. Thank God there’s only a few more days until this hell of a month is over. 

He fidgets, twists fingers in hands, “I just didn’t want to leave you behind.”

George blinks. His eyes burn. “Well, you did it anyway.” 

“I didn’t know how to say goodbye to someone who meant so much to me,” Dream finally says. 

George’s head feels like it's full of television static, his heart full of pins. 

“You could have just  _ said  _ something!” George explodes. “You could have said something, anything. Literally anything other than complete ghosting.” 

“I thought— I thought—” Dream swallows, gestures vaguely with a hand, and eventually manages to say, “If I said something, or if it was anything other than just silence, all it would do was hurt more.” 

“You’re so stupid,” George says angrily. “You’re so, so fucking stupid.” 

“I— I know. I know.” 

“ _ Anything  _ would have been better than what you did.” 

“I know.”

“You hurt me.” 

“I was hurting too,” Dream says defensively, and he stumbles over his words, tripping over them in trying to find the right ones to say, “I regretted it as soon as I boarded the plane, but I was just so scared of what you would say. And every day afterwards made it worse until suddenly it was months later, and I just…” 

Dream trails off, and George clenches his hands at his side. 

He hates him. He hates him so much. 

“Are you angry?” Dream says quietly, into the bitter silence. “It’s okay if you are. I just want to know.”

_ I want to know if I was right. If my fears were right all along. _

“I’m not angry,” George says hollowly, honestly, because he’s truly not. Not at this point. “I’m just so tired.” 

Dream nods, and some tension leaches out of his shoulders, draining away. They’re both tired, George can see it in every inch of Dream’s body. 

The sun dips further over the horizon, and a palm tree waving in the distance lengthens its shadow and it falls over both of them. The remaining light is golden, and Dream’s perfectly silhouetted. 

In a desperate, obvious attempt to break the silence, Dream says, “I got my degree. In English.”

“Congratulations,” George says sourly. “I’m sure that’s going to do you much good.”

“I didn’t find a job,” Dream says. “I’m back living with my parents.” 

It takes a lot of effort for George not to laugh. To his credit, he doesn’t.

“Well,” George says, “There’s always an opening if you want to work minimum wage with me. Or at the coffee shop down the street.” 

“I’m considering it,” Dream says truthfully. “I need a job somehow.”

Long, long silence, in which neither of them move. The only sound is a songbird overhead, fluttering away with the daytime. It calls out mournfully to the night, beckoning it onwards. 

“I miss you,” Dream says quietly. 

George’s eyes sting. “I missed you too.” 

Dream’s hand, fidgeting by his side. He still has a band-aid wrapped around his thumb, right where he would always pick at it. It seems like a lot of things still haven’t changed. Old habits still stick. Absurdly George wants to reach out and hold it. 

“You know,” Dream says awkwardly, “The community college here has really good classes on computer science. I was looking into it.” 

“Ah,” George says. 

“If you wanted,” Dream starts, “I know you want— or wanted— to do that. So it’s there. As an option.” 

George nods once, quickly. He’s self aware enough to recognize that Dream is trying to do something. He’s doing his best. 

“So,” George says, the word burning in his mouth, “You really want to fix things?”

_ With me  _ goes unspoken. 

“I’d like to,” Dream says. “If you wanted.” 

And oh God, doesn’t George want that? He wants, he wants, he wants. He wants so many things. He wants to be able to go grocery shopping without checking every price tag three times over. He wants the stupid broken radiator in the break room of the burger place to be fixed so that he and Sylvee won’t fight for their place in front of the fan. He wants to leave this small, shitty town and go out and see the world. He wants Dream back at his side. He wants, he wants, he wants. 

“Okay,” George says, voice strangled. “It’s worth a shot.”

The relief that floods Dream’s face is a beautiful thing to witness. Quietly, carefully, almost like he doesn’t want the answer, Dream asks, “Can I kiss you?” 

_ Yes. More than anything, all I’ve wanted for the last four years.  _

“Yes,” George says. “You can.” 

Dream’s hands, delicately, come under his chin and tilt his head up. The kiss is dizzyingly slow and achingly familiar. George wants to press himself closer to him, until they’re merged like two parts of one whole. 

But he doesn’t do any of those things. And after what could have been a minute, an hour, a day, or a lifetime, they step apart, George tries to remember how to breathe. Everything feels so slow and syrupy. 

He hates that Dream sets him aflame like this, sends every nerve of his buzzing. He hates that he’ll never be able to say no to Dream, no matter how much it kills him inside.

“Are you going to stay?” George asks quietly.

Dream nods. “I promise.”

_ Promise. _

George swallows and says, “You’ve been real shit with your promises recently.”

“I’ll keep this one.”

“You’d better.” 

“Or else I might not forgive you this time,” George warns. 

Dream laughs, choked. “I know.” 

“I still don’t know if I forgive you,” George says. He doesn’t mean to say it, but the words slip out anyway. Dream has the grace to look chastised, and he takes a step backward.

“I don’t expect you to,” Dream says quietly. “It’s okay if you don’t.” 

“I’ll try,” George says. Honestly. “I will.” 

He wants, he wants, he wants. He wants to hold Dream’s hand and so he does. He wants to kiss Dream again and so he does. He wants to invite Dream back to his place, sit on opposite ends of the sofa, hook his ankle over Dream’s, eventually kiss him again, underneath the colorful lights of the television, hands interlaced, pulse racing, breaths slow and steady.

He wants. And so he does. 

**Author's Note:**

> if you enjoyed, please leave kudos or comments!! they rly make my day and i love to hear what you all think <3


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